"You may depend upon it that the fields were a fat slice, and so there were plenty of people ready to move here and bid defiance to the devil. But the old Evil One was too artful for them; he began to make such a rumpus here with supernatural performances day and night, so that no one was sure of his life, much less of his sinful soul. If they sat in their homes, the chairs were pulled from under them, and the porridge-bowl rolled of its own accord down on the floor; the stones were torn from the walls and were showered around people's ears. If they went out in the woods they were no better off; they had to keep a sharp look-out that the trees did not come crashing down upon their heads, although the weather might be perfectly quiet, and that the ground did not open under their feet, and draw them down into a bottomless pit. And when I think that we are now travelling through the same woods ... Oh, oh, I am sinking..."
"You fool, it is only the pure snow!—and then you say people could not stand it any longer?"
"They all moved away, so that there was not even a cat left, except an old cottager, but I suppose he died long ago. The whole settlement was again deserted, the ditches filled up, the fields became covered with moss, and the pine-woods spread over the former grain lands. It is now forty years since that time..."
And Pekka, who was not in the habit of making long speeches, seemed astonished at his own loquacity, and came to a sudden stop as he reigned in his horse.
"What is it now?" asked Bertel impatiently.
"I don't see a glimpse of the light."
"Neither do I. It is hidden by the trees."
"No, dear master, it is not concealed by the trees; it has sunk into the earth after decoying us here into the depths of the forest. Did not I tell you that it would be so? We shall never get out of this alive."
"For the devil's sake ride on and do not stop, else both man and beast will stiffen with the cold. It seems to me I see something like a hut over there."
"Fine hut; it is nothing but a granite rock with grey sides, from which the wind has blown away the snow. It is all over with us."